Prado Alvarez v. R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co.

          United States Court of Appeals
                     For the First Circuit

No. 04-1695

       VIRGINIA PRADO ALVAREZ; MAYRA JANETTE GARCIA PRADO;
            EDGARDO GARCIA PRADO; ORLANDO GARCIA PRADO;
          IVELLISE GARCIA PRADO; FRANCISCO GARCIA PRADO;
  JAVIER GARCIA PRADO; CARMEN ROSA ADORNO; JOHAM GARCIA ADORNO,

                     Plaintiffs, Appellants,

                                v.

              R.J. REYNOLDS TOBACCO COMPANY, INC.,

                      Defendant, Appellee.


          APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

                 FOR THE DISTRICT OF PUERTO RICO

      [Hon. Jaime Pieras, Jr., Senior U.S. District Judge]


                             Before

                       Selya, Circuit Judge,
                  Coffin, Senior Circuit Judge,
                    and Lipez, Circuit Judge.



     Herbert Muriel with whom Amarilys Arocho-Maldonado was on
brief for appellants.
     Robert H. Klonoff with whom Paul R. Reichert, Jones Day,
Salvador Antonetti Zequeira, Luis A. Oliver, Rosalie Irizarry
Silvestri, and Fiddler, Gonzalez & Rodriguez, P.S.C. were on brief
for appellee.



                         April 21, 2005
       COFFIN, Senior Circuit Judge.     Francisco García López began

smoking in 1960, at age 25, and continued the habit for the next 42

years, ultimately smoking three packs of Winston cigarettes each

day.   He died in October 2002, three months after being diagnosed

with lung cancer.      His surviving family members brought this

diversity action against the cigarette manufacturer, R.J. Reynolds

Tobacco Co., claiming that smoking was a substantial factor in his

illness and death.   Plaintiffs sought to recover damages based on

a variety of tort and other Commonwealth law theories, including

failure to warn and defective design. The district court dismissed

a failure to warn claim and granted summary judgment for defendant

Reynolds on all other claims.          After careful scrutiny of the

record, we affirm substantially for the reasons articulated by the

court.

                             I. Background

       Decedent García had only a sixth grade education and could

read little Spanish and no English.     Although he did not watch much

television, several family members testified in depositions that he

did regularly view the evening news.     His wife and at least four of

his children also testified that, at various points during the

years García smoked, they urged him to stop because of the health

risks posed by cigarettes.    According to the undisputed facts the

parties jointly submitted to the district court, García's wife and

daughter had "years ago . . . talked about how the Decedent was


                                 -2-
smoking too much."       His wife acknowledged that, when she first saw

him smoking, she warned him that it could be bad for his health.

     The family reported one or two attempts by Garcia to stop

smoking by using nicotine gum as a substitute.            His son, Javier

García Prado, testified that he gave his father one pack of the

gum, and that the attempt lasted about two days and resulted in

reduced smoking during that time.           A daughter, Ivellise García

Prado, said she bought him both nicotine gum and patches once he

had developed a cough and was feeling ill; she said he used the gum

and it reduced his smoking "a little," but he refused to use the

patches.    Another daughter, Mayra Janette García Prado, testified

that her father stopped using the gum given to him by her sister

because "there were no results." Decedent's grandson, Joham García

Adorno,    who   lived   with   his   grandparents,   testified   that   his

grandfather used the patches once and that he stopped smoking, but

he did not remember for how long.

     Another son, Edgardo García Prado, also noted his father's use

of the nicotine gum, but said that he never completely stopped

smoking.    Edgardo testified that he "would tell [his father] to

stop smoking every day and he would pay no attention."               Still

another son, Orlando, testified that, when family members or

friends would tell his father that smoking was harmful, he would

say "that we all have to die some time from something . . . . He

always had the same answer."          Decedent's brother, Demetrio García


                                      -3-
Lopez, testified that he had been telling his brother that smoking

was harmful since about 1970.        Demetrio said he did not know his

brother's perception of the health risks of smoking, noting, "[t]he

thing is that he would not pay any attention to anybody, so it just

didn't matter to him."

     García's wife, Virginia Prado Alvarez, testified that, in May

2002, her husband stopped smoking because the price of cigarettes

increased,1 and he could no longer afford to buy them.          He became

bedridden, and, according to his wife, "[h]e was feeling very sick

because he wasn't smoking."      He was experiencing both abdominal

pain and a dry cough, and medical tests ultimately revealed a right

upper lung mass that was diagnosed as inoperable cancer.               He

deteriorated rapidly and died in October 2002 at the age of 68.

     Appellants filed suit in June 2003, claiming that García's

illness and death were caused by his smoking Winston cigarettes,

which are manufactured by appellee R.J. Reynolds.          They alleged

negligence and strict liability claims under Puerto Rico law for

failure   to   warn   and   design    defect,   claims   for   fraudulent

misrepresentation and concealment, and a claim for violation of

Article 189 of the Puerto Rico Penal Code, 33 P.R. Laws Ann. §

4307, which prohibits "[f]raud in [the] delivery of [a] thing."




     1
      A daughter also testified that he stopped smoking because of
a price increase in May 2002.

                                     -4-
     The district court dismissed the post-1969 failure-to-warn

claims based on preemption by the Federal Cigarette Labeling and

Advertising Act, 15 U.S.C. §§ 1331-1341, and it subsequently

granted summary judgment on the remaining claims.         The court

concluded that plaintiffs had failed to establish that ordinary

consumers were unaware of the health risks of cigarette smoking

during the relevant time period, undermining both the design defect

and the pre-1969 failure-to-warn claims.     The court further ruled

that plaintiffs failed to adduce evidence of a design defect or to

offer evidence that the decedent's injuries were proximately caused

by Reynolds' failure to warn. The court rejected the fraud claims,

inter alia, for lack of evidence of false statements heard or

reasonably relied on by decedent, and it concluded that the Article

189 claim suffered from dispositive deficiencies.

        On appeal, appellants challenge each of the district court's

summary judgment rulings.2

                            II. Discussion

     We review the district court's grant of summary judgment de

novo.    Cruz Vargas v. R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co., 348 F.3d 271, 280

(1st Cir. 2003).     Although we draw all reasonable inferences in

favor of the nonmoving party, id., that party must respond to a



     2
       At oral argument, appellants' attorney stated that they no
longer were pursuing their negligence claims; the failure-to-warn
and design defect claims thus remain only as strict liability
causes of action.

                                  -5-
properly supported motion with sufficient evidence to allow a

reasonable jury to find in its favor "with respect to each issue on

which [it] has the burden of proof," DeNovellis v. Shalala, 124

F.3d 298, 306 (1st Cir. 1997).        See also Rochester Ford Sales,Inc.

v. Ford Motor Co., 287 F.2d 32, 38 (1st Cir. 2002).                 With that

standard in mind, we turn to our examination of appellants' claims.

      A. The Role of Common Knowledge

      As the district court observed, appellants may not prevail on

either the common law failure to warn or the design defect claims

unless they can show that the ordinary consumer was unaware of the

dangers of smoking.          See Cruz Vargas, 348 F.3d at 275 ("[A]

manufacturer cannot be held liable under either strict liability or

negligence for failure to warn of a danger commonly known to the

public."); Aponte Rivera v. Sears Roebuck, 44 P.R. Offic. Trans. 1,

7, 144 D.P.R. 830 (1998) ("[A] manufacturer need not warn of a

hazard if the average consumer ordinarily has knowledge of the

dangers of the product."); Aponte Rivera, 44 P.R. Offic. Trans. at

6, 144 D.P.R. 830 (citing § 402A of the Restatement (Second) of

Torts, comment i, which states that a product is defective only if

it   is   "dangerous    to    an   extent   beyond   that   which   would    be

contemplated by the ordinary consumer who purchases it, with the

ordinary    knowledge        common   to    the   community    as    to     its

characteristics").




                                      -6-
     Both parties sought to establish their position on common

knowledge through expert evidence, but Reynolds filed a motion to

exclude the testimony of plaintiffs' proposed expert, Marly Ferrer

Montalvo, claiming inter alia, that she lacked the requisite

education and experience to qualify as an expert.              Although the

district court did not explicitly rule on this motion, it did not

refer to Ferrer's report in its summary judgment decision, relying

entirely on the common knowledge conclusions of Reynolds' expert,

Luis Martínez-Fernández.    The court's silence seems to us to imply

rejection of plaintiffs' expert evidence, a ruling that would be

subject to review only for abuse of discretion.             See Kumho Tire

Co., Ltd. v. Carmichael, 526 U.S. 137, 152 (1999); Gen. Elec. Co.

v. Joiner, 522 U.S. 136, 138-39 (1997); Currier v. United Techs.

Corp., 393 F.3d 246, 251 (1st Cir. 2004).              In any event, as we

shall explain, even under de novo review we would conclude that

Ferrer's presentation is inadequate, particularly in light of

Martínez'   detailed   affidavit,    to   permit   a    jury   to   find   for

plaintiffs on the issue of common knowledge.

     In Cruz Vargas, we observed that the "common knowledge"

defense is assessed objectively and, "despite the nomenclature, it

is a technical question involving methods, financing, and sources

of research beyond the competence of lay determination, at least

when pertaining to history forty or fifty years removed from the

time of trial."   348 F.3d at 277.        In performing its gatekeeping


                                    -7-
function in assessing proffered expert evidence, a court must

consider "whether the putative expert is 'qualified by "knowledge,

skill, experience, training, or education."'"                Ed Peters Jewelry

Co. v. C & J Jewelry Co., 124 F.3d 252, 259 (1st Cir. 1997); see

also Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharms., Inc., 509 U.S. 579, 592 (1993)

("relaxation of the usual requirement of first-hand knowledge . .

. is premised on an assumption that the expert's opinion will have

a   reliable    basis     in    the    knowledge      and   experience   of    his

discipline"); Poulis-Minott v. Smith, 388 F.3d 354, 359-60 (1st

Cir. 2004); Fed. R. Evid. 702. Ferrer's qualifications to serve as

an expert were marginal, at best.

     At the time of her report, Ferrer possessed only a bachelor's

degree   in    history,   and    most     of   her    research   experience    was

irrelevant to the issue of common knowledge of the health risks of

smoking.      Her master's thesis (written but, at the time of her

report, not yet presented) related to the history of the Republic

of Haiti, and her most recent work was as an archivist on a

collection     of   documents         relating   to    public    works   in    the

Commonwealth.       As a graduate student in 2001, she presented a

paper on Haiti at a Puerto Rican Historians Congress.                         Other

experiences included about two years teaching high school students

Puerto Rican and Latin American history, researching the history of

the paso fino horse in Puerto Rico, working as a cultural tour

guide in Old San Juan, and assisting a university professor with


                                         -8-
research on neo-colonial history, particularly in the Caribbean,

but excluding Cuba and Puerto Rico.   Toward the end of that year of

research, she did her only directly relevant work: collecting

materials about tobacco advertising in Puerto Rico. Her particular

assignment was to focus on religious and gossip magazines; in her

deposition, she described this work as photocopying information,

without analysis.

     In sum, to grant the status of expert to one at the outset of

an academic career, with such a variegated and unfocused record of

scholarly efforts and minimal attention to analysis, would threaten

the effective functioning of the gatekeeper process.         Expert

witnesses are "permitted wide latitude to offer opinions," Daubert,

509 U.S. at 592, and "'[e]xpert evidence can be both powerful and

quite misleading because of the difficulty in evaluating it,'" id.

at 595 (quoting Weinstein, "Rule 702 of the Federal Rules of

Evidence is Sound; It Should Not Be Amended," 138 F.R.D. 631, 632

(1991)).   That a testifying expert thus should have achieved a

meaningful threshold of expertise seems beyond debate.

     Reynolds' expert, Martínez, was considerably more qualified in

every relevant respect.   A history professor since 1983, he earned

his doctoral degree from Duke University in 1990 and, at the time

of his affidavit, was a professor of history and Puerto Rican and

Hispanic Caribbean Studies at Rutgers University.   Author of seven

books and monographs and more than twenty articles and essays, he


                                -9-
also   has   given    more   than   thirty   lectures   on   Latin   American

historical topics at colleges and universities.                 Among other

scholarly awards, he received in 2000 the Lydia Cabrera Award of

the Conference on Latin American History.          He has taught a variety

of courses on Latin American, Caribbean and United States history,

and the course subject matter has included "the role of tobacco in

Caribbean    and     Latin   American   culture,   economy   and     society."

Martínez' extensive professional involvement included serving as

chair of the Caribbean Studies Committee for the Conference on

Latin American History.

       The two experts' proposed evidence also differed markedly. In

a seven-page report based on approximately 130 hours of work,

Ferrer reported that she had reviewed the bulletin and magazine of

the Puerto Rican Medical Association from 1930 through 1970,

reports of the Department of Public Health and the Commissioner of

Education, and a series of movies developed by the Department of

Education to address various social problems in Puerto Rico.               She

stated that she investigated the newspaper El Mundo from the 1930s

through 1985 and found "some coverage of the health problems caused

by cigarette use," but her report gives no specific citations to

articles other than to state that she had found "approximately 15

articles [in 1964] on different subjects relating to tobacco, some

of which included health problems that may be caused by smoking

cigarettes."       She acknowledged that her research was not yet


                                     -10-
complete,    noting   that    she    was      still    investigating       several

magazines, including Readers Digest, which she noted was published

in Spanish beginning in December 1940.3

     Based    on   the   limited      materials        she    reviewed,     Ferrer

nevertheless concluded that "the research on the effects of tobacco

use and cigarette smoking was only beginning in the 1950s and

1960s," and she observed that pervasive cigarette advertising

"rendered futile any educational attempt to minimize the use of

cigarette products."         She    further    observed      that   much   of   the

information about smoking that was available to Puerto Ricans was

translated from English, and noted that "many times the basic ideas

and concepts are lost in translation."4               She emphasized that this

language difficulty was exacerbated by the high percentage of

illiteracy among Puerto Rico's residents.                    She concluded that

decedent could have had no knowledge of nicotine addiction or the

health risks of smoking because of the ambiguous nature of the

information available to him.              These conclusions were framed



     3
      On the second day of her deposition, about four months after
she first was deposed, she reported that she had in the interim
checked "some issues" of the newspapers El Imparcial and El Vocero
and also had reviewed the catalog of the national archive movie
section, where she uncovered one agricultural documentary about
growing tobacco in Puerto Rico.
     4
       During her deposition, she was unable to cite any specific
instances of such confusion and, upon questioning by defense
counsel, agreed that two apparently translated articles shown to
her from El Mundo that had been published in 1954 and 1955 would
have been understood as linking smoking and cancer.

                                     -11-
generally,    and    none    was   supported   by   specific   citations   to

sources.5

     By contrast, Martínez reported in his 31-page affidavit a wide

variety of materials that he had examined. Among other sources, he

reviewed weekly magazines, island-wide daily newspapers, Puerto

Rican and national health publications, Puerto Rican laws relating

to tobacco, smoking, cigarettes and health instruction; education

materials, including health education courses and school texts;

religious    and    church   publications;     polling   and   survey   data;

"materials related to popular culture"; and various government

documents.     His conclusions were annotated with 112 footnotes

identifying specific sources. In addition to written materials, he

stated that he considered "the role of oral tradition, which is

particularly strong in Puerto Rico."

     Based on his research, Martínez opined "to a reasonable degree

of historical certainty" that throughout the decedent's lifetime



     5
       We note as well that Ferrer's report was not sworn, which
diminishes its potency as probative evidence.       See Carmona v.
Toledo, 215 F.3d 124, 131 (1st Cir. 2000) ("Documents supporting or
opposing summary judgment must be properly authenticated. . . . 'To
be admissible at the summary judgment stage, "documents must be
authenticated by and attached to an affidavit that meets the
requirements of Rule 56(e)."'"); Young v. City of Providence, 301
F. Supp.2d 163, 177 (D.R.I. 2004), aff'd in part, rev'd in part and
remanded by 2005 WL 826073 (1st Cir. Apr. 11, 2005)(declining to
credit expert's report on the assumption that it was not affirmed
under oath by means of "an affidavit or any other sworn
testimony"). Our conclusion on common knowledge does not, however,
depend on this flaw, and Ferrer in any event reviewed her research
during a lengthy deposition.

                                     -12-
the general public received an "abundance of information" on the

health risks of smoking and the difficulty some smokers encounter

in attempting to quit.     He thus concluded that there has been

"widespread, pervasive common knowledge throughout the twentieth

century that cigarette smoking can cause serious life-shortening

diseases, such as lung cancer, emphysema, hypertension, and heart

disease."   He further reported common knowledge that cigarette

smoking "can be habit forming, addictive, and/or very difficult for

some to quit."

     More   persuasive   than   these    general,   perhaps   overbroad,

conclusions were his more particular references to sources of

public information in the critical decade of the 1950s, immediately

before the decedent started smoking.        For example, his affidavit

cited nine articles related to smoking and health that appeared in

Selecciones del Reader's Digest between March 1950 and May 1959.

He reported that one of them, published in September 1954, noted

that "'13 unrelated studies have been done on the relationship

between cancer and tobacco in five differen[t] countries . . . all

these researchers reached the same conclusion: lung cancer appears

more frequently among smoker[s] than among non-smokers.'" (citing

"Lo que se sabe del cigarillo y el cáncer," Selecciones del

Reader's Digest, September 1954).       He stated that another article,

published in February 1953, referenced a study concluding that

"'From the age of 45 onward, the danger of acquiring the illness


                                 -13-
[lung cancer] increases in direct proportion to the amount of

tobacco     smoked    .    .    .   .'"       (citing    "Cáncer   por    cajetillas,"

Selecciones del Reader's Digest, February 1953).                         He also cited

more than a dozen articles in the newspaper El Mundo during the

1950s referring to smoking and health, including specifically the

relationship between smoking and cancer, and he pointed to similar

coverage in the early 1960s in both El Mundo and the San Juan Star.

        According to Martínez, the issue of addiction also received

specific attention in both periodicals and newspapers.                      He cited a

1952 article in El Mundo that noted the difficulties of quitting

smoking and that "the seductive qualities of tobacco are doubtless

owing to the effect of the nicotine it contains."                      (citing "Sobre

café y tabaco," El Mundo, April 24, 1952).                     He stated that other

references to the difficulty of quitting smoking appeared in

"[p]opular and widely circulating magazines" such as Selecciones

del Reader's Digest and Alma Latina, and the footnote corresponding

to   that   statement          listed     twelve     sources   (including    the   nine

Reader's Digest articles noted above) addressing that topic and/or

the general issue of smoking and health, including the link to lung

cancer.      Martínez also pointed to newspaper advertisements for

"stop    smoking      methods"       and      "highly    publicized"      anti-smoking

campaigns     in     the   1960s        and   1970s     that   included    educational

workshops to help smokers quit – messages that implicitly, if not

explicitly, communicated smoking's addictive nature.                       Educational


                                              -14-
information reviewed by Martínez included a 1944 junior high school

health education bulletin directing teachers to stress to students

that tobacco is habit-forming and that smoking, once started, is

difficult to quit

       In light of these contrasting expert reports, we agree with

the district court that no reasonable jury, confined to the record,

could conclude that the general public in Puerto Rico lacked

knowledge about the risks of smoking, including lung cancer, by the

time decedent first started smoking in 1960.6                  A reasonable juror

could not reject Martínez' detailed and comprehensive report in

favor of Ferrer's conclusory and incomplete assessment. As was the

case       with   his    testimony     in   Cruz   Vargas,   "Martínez'   research

followed an accepted method of historical analysis and drew on a

breadth of sources . . . contemporaneous with the time period at

issue       in    the   case,"   348   F.3d   at   278.      Ferrer's   attempt   to

neutralize the significance of the information disseminated on

smoking and health by focusing on Puerto Rico's literacy problems

falls short given Martínez' credible assertion of Puerto Rico's

oral tradition.           Indeed, Martí.nez' opinion was validated by the


       6
       Appellants claim in their brief that Puerto Rico utilizes a
"more stringent" approach to the common knowledge doctrine,
requiring a finding in this case that consumers were aware not
simply that cigarette smoking is hazardous to health but of "the
specific connection between smoking and lung cancer (the disease
that caused decedent's death) and/or the addictive nature of
cigarettes." To the extent this is a correct statement of Puerto
Rico law, an issue we do not reach, it does not affect our
conclusion because Martínez' analysis met that standard.

                                            -15-
testimony of García's wife that she knew at the time he started

smoking that cigarettes posed a health risk – and that she told him

so.

      We therefore agree with the district court that, in failing to

show a lack of common knowledge of the risks of smoking – and in

particular,       the   risk   of   lung       cancer    –   appellants       offered

insufficient evidence to support either their failure-to-warn or

design defect claims.

      B. Other Elements of the Tort Claims

      We note, moreover, that plaintiffs' evidence also fell short

of demonstrating the requisite proximate cause between either a

failure to warn or design defect and decedent's death from lung

cancer.     As    detailed     above,     decedent      chose   to   disregard       his

family's    and    friends'    repeated        admonitions      that    he    give    up

cigarettes because of the health risk, stating his intention to

continue smoking despite its link to disease and death because "we

all have to die some time from something."                      This attitude was

expressed    notwithstanding        the    explicit      warning       on    cigarette

packages, beginning in the mid-1980s, that smoking causes lung

cancer and other serious diseases. Thus, on this record, warnings

appear irrelevant to decedent's decision-making.7 Accord Estate of


      7
       Nor are appellants aided by the fact that the package
warnings were in English, a language decedent did not speak. His
exposure to the label information was inevitable given the evidence
that he regularly watched the evening news, and he presumably was
exposed to the information as well through word-of-mouth.

                                        -16-
White v. R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co., 109 F. Supp.2d 424, 435 (D. Md.

2000) (proof that decedent ignored verbal warnings and warning

labels on cigarette packages shows lack of proximate cause for

decedent's    cigarette-related    injuries);    see    Glassner   v.   R.J.

Reynolds Tobacco Co., 223 F.3d 343, 351-52 (6th Cir. 2000) (finding

that common knowledge doctrine bars design defect and failure-to-

warn claims under Ohio product liability law where "decedent began

smoking in 1969 [after the federal labeling act was in effect] and

continued to smoke up until her death in 1997," affirming earlier

precedent focusing "not on the point at which the plaintiff began

smoking, but rather, the point at which she quit smoking").

      In addition, the contention that nicotine's addictive nature

rendered decedent incapable of stopping once he started smoking –

a point asserted but undeveloped in appellants' brief – is belied

by the testimony of his wife and daughter that he stopped near the

end of his life because he no longer could afford the cost of

cigarettes.    Although he briefly tried nicotine patches and gum

provided by family members, the evidence that he deliberately chose

to continue smoking despite its life-shortening effect undermines

the   genuineness   of   those   attempts   to   stop   and,   thus,    their

probative value.    In sum, the evidence taken as a whole forecloses

a jury finding that Reynolds' failure to warn of the health hazards

of smoking before 1969 was a proximate cause of decedent's lung

cancer.   Cf. Tompkin v. American Brands, 219 F.3d 566, 568, 575


                                   -17-
(6th Cir. 2000) (court reversed summary judgment for defendants on

failure-to-warn and design defect claims based on factual question

regarding common knowledge where decedent gave up smoking in 1965,

at age 31, after smoking for 15 years).

     Nor did decedent ever switch to available brands of cigarettes

with lower levels of tar or nicotine in an effort to lower the risk

to his health; he instead remained loyal throughout his life to

regular Winstons. Thus, Reynolds' failure to develop a "healthier"

cigarette design also could not be deemed the cause of his illness

and death.

     For these reasons as well, appellants' failure-to-warn and

design defect claims were properly dismissed.8

     C. Remaining Claims

     Appellants also asserted a fraud claim and a claim under

Article 189 of the Puerto Rico Criminal Code, which punishes

"[f]raud in delivery of [a] thing," 33 P.R. Laws Ann. § 4307.9   The

district court found no allegations of reliance to support the

fraud claim, see, e.g., Microsoft Corp. v. Computer Warehouse, 83

F. Supp.2d 256, 262 (D.P.R. 2000) (listing elements of fraud under


     8
       The district court also relied on preemption doctrine to
dismiss appellants' claims.    As our discussion so far fully
resolves the issues, we see no need to engage in additional
analysis.
     9
       Section 4307 provides, in relevant part: "Any person who
defrauds in the substance, quality or quantity of the thing he
delivers by virtue of an obligation in order to secure an undue
profit for himself or a third party shall be punished . . . ."

                               -18-
Puerto Rico law); Wadsworth, Inc. v. Schwarz-Nin, 951 F. Supp. 314,

323 (D.P.R. 1996) (same), and appellants do not dispute that

omission.   Instead, they argue that the court erred by considering

only fraud by misrepresentation and not fraud by concealment, a

concept of Puerto Rico law known as "dolo" that does not require

proof of detrimental reliance on false representations.

     As appellants acknowledge, however, "dolo" is a form of

contractual deceit, see Generadora de Electricidad del Caribe, Inc.

v. Foster Wheeler Corp., 92 F. Supp.2d 8, 18-19 (D.P.R. 2000);

P.C.M.E. Commercial, S.E. v. Pace Membership Warehouse, Inc., 952

F. Supp. 84, 92 (D.P.R. 1997); Fournier v. Eastern Airlines, Inc.,

655 F. Supp. 1037, 1039 (D.P.R. 1987), and there are neither

allegations nor evidence to support a contractual relationship

between appellee   Reynolds   and   the   decedent.   "Dolo"   is   thus

inapplicable in these circumstances.

     Appellants' claim under Article 189 fares no better.           Their

argument for liability under this provision presumes a contractual

relationship under which Reynolds was obliged to deliver a safe

product. As noted above, however, the basis for such a contractual

obligation was not alleged.   Appellants offer no legal support for

their implicit assertion that the purchase of a consumer product,

without more, can establish a contractual relationship; nor have

they explained how Reynolds' sale of Winston cigarettes to the

decedent failed to fulfill any specific promises made to him


                                -19-
regarding the "substance, quality or quantity" of the product to be

delivered.   Article 189, like "dolo," is simply inapt.

     For the forgoing reasons, the judgment of the district court

is affirmed.




                               -20-